Comparison

MarginNote 4 vs flomo浮墨

Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.

Head to head
About

MarginNote 4

This app integrates reading, note-taking, mind mapping, and flashcards into a unified study environment. It supports active learning with features like study sets, book compilation, and dual-article views. Enhance your understanding with visual learning tools and AI-powered content extraction for long-term memory retention.

Highlights
  • Integrated reading, note-taking, mind mapping, and flashcards
  • Quick Extend Note and Handwriting Layers for annotation
  • Study Set for organizing PDFs, EPUBs, videos, and audio
  • Mind Map and Concept Diagram for visual learning
  • AI Content Detection for formula and chart extraction
  • FSRS spaced-repetition algorithm for reviews
  • iCloud sync across Apple devices
Features
Read full description

MarginNote is the PDF study tool for deep readers. One excerpt is a PDF highlight, a mind map node, and a flashcard — one capture, three places. This is the Card Axis architecture, so you stop ferrying content between a PDF reader, a notes app, and a flashcard tool. A decade of iteration. 188K+ App Store ratings. 【Four Featured Mechanics】 ▸ Card Axis — One excerpt, three renders. Document highlight, mind map node, and flashcard are the same card seen from three angles. ▸ Title Link — Old notes auto-surface in new documents. When a familiar concept appears in what you're reading, your past annotation lights up on the page. ▸ Extended Note — Long-press anywhere on a PDF to open writing space. No anchored text required; three display modes (inline / margin / collapsed). ▸ Immersive Mode (4.4) — Three-state toggle: Read / Write / Recall. UI folds away. Recall blurs excerpts with Gaussian blur — tap to reveal only after you've actually recalled. 【AI Capabilities (introduced in 4.2)】 AI book breakdown · AI OCR templates · AI translation · AI Q&A · AI flashcard generation Our stance is AI as assistant, not replacement — every suggestion can be saved as your own thinking node, never thinking for you. 【Apple Intelligence (iOS 26+)】 Recall Mode hints can run on-device via Apple Intelligence — pick "Apple AI" or "cloud LLM" in Settings. With Apple AI selected, three tiers of help — Neighbor Coordinate · Reasoning Prompt · Key Distinction — are generated by Apple Foundation Models right on your device: no network calls, no AI credits used, your notes never leave your device. Even if you've selected cloud LLM, going offline auto-falls back to Apple Intelligence (provided your device supports it) — so libraries, planes, and exam-day silent rooms never break your hint loop. 【Full Workflow】 Fast OCR · Study Sets (PDF / EPUB / video / audio) · direct read from Zotero / cloud drives / USB · 10 mind map styles · book recomposition · dual-document compare · concept maps · handwriting layers 【FSRS Spaced Repetition】 Built on the open-spaced-repetition project's algorithm (paper accepted by ACM SIGKDD; Anki has used FSRS as its default scheduler since v23.10). Push short-term memory into long-term. 【Built For】 Anyone re-reading a single document until it sticks — med school (USMLE / MCAT) · law school (LSAT / bar exam) · grad prep (GRE / GMAT / CFA) · researchers · language learners (IELTS / TOEFL) · serious readers. 【All Apple Platforms】 iPhone + iPad + Mac under one Apple ID. iCloud syncs Study Sets, notes, and review progress. Native Apple Pencil support on iPad. — Questions? Email service@marginnote.com Terms: https://dist.marginnote.com/MarginNote_Terms_and_Conditions.pdf Privacy: https://dist.marginnote.com/MarginNote_Privacy_Policy.pdf

About

flomo浮墨

Capture fleeting thoughts and ideas with a minimalist note-taking tool designed for quick entry and organization. Review past entries, discover related notes, and quantify your daily records without intrusive ads or privacy concerns.

Highlights
  • Easy typing
  • Full platform sync
  • Organize with #tags
  • Daily review of past notes
  • Relevant note suggestions
  • Quantify daily records
  • Quick entry via API
Features
Read full description

flomo is the Next Generation note-taking tool, focusing on helping your record more ideas rather than complex articles. We are overjoyed to announce that we ranked in the No.4 of the Golden Kitty Awards 2021 on Product Hunt in the Mobile Apps category. Thank you for your support and suggestions. We can’t keep making progress without your voice. Key features - Easy typing like Twitter - Full platform sync - Manage MEMOs by #tags/sub-tags - Daily review of past MEMOs - Relevant MEMOs - Quantify daily records - Quick entry with API - No ads or privacy sharing What flomo doesn't do well We know it's hard enough to be good at one small thing, so we won't try to be ALL-IN-ONE in features. Here's what we're NOT good at, and we recommend you to choose a better product. - Not good at Document writing or markdown - Not good at Web Clipper - Not good at TODO - Not good at Mind mapping flomo CARES about privacy and security - All content is only visible to you - All data transfers are encrypted - No commercial advertising - No sharing or selling of personal data - Real-time database backup —————————— Price may vary by location. Subscriptions will be charged to your credit card through your iTunes account. Your subscription will automatically renew unless canceled at least 24 hours before the end of the current period. You will not be able to cancel the subscription once activated. After purchase, manage your subscriptions in App Store Account Settings. Any unused portion of a free trial period, will be forfeited when the user purchases a subscription. —————————— 2024@flomoapp.com Privacy Policy: https://help.flomo.app/terms-and-privacy/privacy Terms of Service: https://help.flomo.app/terms-and-privacy/terms

Screenshots

MarginNote 44 screens
flomo浮墨4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is review sentiment: flomo浮墨 at 92% against MarginNote 4's 58%. flomo浮墨 also leads on rating (4.9 vs 4.5) and update cadence (weekly vs every 3 weeks). On price, ratings volume, ads and in-app purchases there is nothing between them.

Scored on Price · Rating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings · Update frequency · Ads · In-app purchases · Monetization · Best chart rank · Devices · Requires iOS

CostPrice · In-app purchases · Ads · Monetization

Both are free to download. MarginNote 4 sells 12 in-app purchases, starting at $1.99 per month and flomo浮墨 sells 10 in-app purchases, starting at $1.99 per month. Whichever you choose, the download price is not the number that matters.

ReceptionRating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings

flomo浮墨 holds the better App Store score, 4.9 against 4.5. Both are backed by a comparable volume of ratings — 716 and 1.1K respectively. Written reviews point the same way: 58% of MarginNote 4's written reviews are positive against 92% of flomo浮墨's.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

MarginNote 4 ships an update every 3 weeks, flomo浮墨 weekly. The most recent releases landed on October 17, 2026 and October 20, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard4 real differences · 6 level
MarginNote 4 versus flomo浮墨: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterMarginNote 4flomo浮墨
PriceFreeFree
Rating4.5 (716 ratings)4.9 (1.1K ratings) — better
Positive reviews58.5% of reviews92.2% of reviews — better
Number of ratings7161.1K — better
Update frequencyEvery 3 weeksWeekly — better
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesYesYes
MonetizationFree with in-app purchasesFree with in-app purchases
DevicesiPhone, iPad, MaciPhone, iPad, iPod
Requires iOS17.015.0 — better
Further details — not scored
Size330 MB147 MB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperBeijing Yunsi Software Technology Co., LtdShanghai Xiandi Network Technology Co., Ltd

Customer experience

MarginNote 4

All ratings716 ratings
Positive86.3%
Neutral3.6%
Negative10.1%
Written reviews566 reviews
Positive58.5%
Neutral15.5%
Negative26.0%

flomo浮墨

All ratings1,134 ratings
Positive98.0%
Neutral0.7%
Negative1.3%
Written reviews167 reviews
Positive92.2%
Neutral3.0%
Negative4.8%

User reviews

MarginNote 4

From 716 App Store ratings

What we love

  • 🚀 Powerful features
  • 📚 Great for academic/research use
  • 👍 Useful note-taking and organization
  • 🖊️ Improved handwriting and annotation

Room to improve

  • 🐛 Buggy and crashes frequently
  • 🕰️ Slow and laggy sync between devices
  • 🤯 Steep learning curve, poor documentation
  • 💰 Expensive upgrade from previous version

flomo浮墨

From 1.1K App Store ratings

What we love

  • 🚀 Efficient and convenient note-taking
  • 👍 Intuitive and user-friendly interface
  • 💡 Powerful tag and sub-tag system
  • 🔒 Secure and private
  • 📚 Great for organizing thoughts and ideas

Room to improve

  • 🐛 Some bugs and glitches reported
  • 💰 Concerns about excessive paid features
  • 📱 Needs better iPad support
  • 🌐 Translation issues for non-Chinese users

Bugs and requests

MarginNote 4

Reported bugs

3 issues
  • Disappearing annotations when using extend function
  • Inability to restore accidentally deleted mind maps
  • Inconsistent behavior with PDF file management

Requested features

4 requests
  • Improved iCloud/cloud sync reliability
  • More intuitive and user-friendly interface
  • Better support for external document libraries
  • Ability to disable auto-excerpt selection

flomo浮墨

Reported bugs

3 issues
  • Inconsistent behavior with list indentation
  • Issues with text scanning functionality
  • Problems with time stamp recognition

Requested features

5 requests
  • Expand note-taking window size
  • Add support for Markdown syntax
  • Integrate with more apps and services
  • Implement dark mode option
  • Add sorting by time/date

In-app purchases

12 purchases

MarginNote 4

Subscriptions5
  • Subscription to MAX (Monthly)7 Days trial$1.991 Month
  • Subscription to MAX (3 months)7 Days trial$4.993 Months
  • Subscription to MAX (6 months)7 Days trial$7.996 Months
Show 2 more
  • Subscription to MAX (Annually)1 Month trial$12.991 Year
  • MarginNote Max Annual1 Month trial$16.991 Year
One-time7
  • 14 days Free Trial2 variantsFree
  • Upgrade to PRO from MN3(iOS)$4.99
  • Unlock PRO Forever (New)$12.99
Show 4 more
  • Upgrade to MAX from MN3(macOS)$19.99
  • Unlock MAX based on PRO$39.99
  • Unlock MAX based on PRO (New)$40.00
  • Unlock MAX Forever (New)$51.99
10 purchases

flomo浮墨

Subscriptions5
  • Monthly Pro subscription$1.991 Month
  • Monthly Max subscription$5.991 Month
  • Yearly Pro subscription$14.991 Year
Show 2 more
  • Yearly Max subscription$39.991 Year
  • Yearly Max subscription1 Year trial$39.991 Year
One-time5
  • 3,000 Agent Points$0.99
  • 10,000 Agent Points$3.99
  • 30,000 Agent Points$9.99
Show 2 more
  • flomo Pro 年度会员-教育优惠$14.99
  • flomo Max 年度会员-教育优惠$34.99

Questions

Is MarginNote 4 free?
MarginNote 4 is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Is flomo浮墨 free?
flomo浮墨 is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Which has better reviews, MarginNote 4 or flomo浮墨?
flomo浮墨 is rated higher. MarginNote 4 averages 4.5 out of 5 from 716 ratings, while flomo浮墨 averages 4.9 from 1.1K ratings.
Do MarginNote 4 or flomo浮墨 have ads?
Neither MarginNote 4 nor flomo浮墨 shows ads.
Which is updated more often, MarginNote 4 or flomo浮墨?
MarginNote 4 ships an update every 3 weeks, and flomo浮墨 weekly. Most recently, MarginNote 4 was updated on October 17, 2026 and flomo浮墨 on October 20, 2026.

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